The Moscow Kremlin Museums will take part in the exhibition project carried out by the State Russian Museum, which is dedicated to the childhood and adolescence of the future Emperor Paul I. The St. Michael's Castle, built by the order of the Emperor Paul I at the turn of the 18th century, houses the exposition. The castle tragically became the place of the Emperor’s murder on the night of March 12, 1801.

Precious items, relating to the life and activities of the Grand Duke, are being exposed for the first time. The exhibition is held within a large-scale project of the Russian Museum, The Romanov Family Saga. It incorporates articles from the Russian Museum’s and other collections, such as portraits of Paul Petrovich and members of his family, paintings representing the Grand Duke’s life events, graphic works, pieces of arts and craft, interior furnishings and utensils of that epoch.

At the exhibition the Moscow Kremlin Museums present an amazing masterpiece from its collection. The gold snuffbox, covered with purple enamel, is decorated with graphic works designed by Grand Duchess Maria Feodorovna in 1790. Four pencil drawings are mounted into a large lid of the snuffbox. The images depict profiles of six older children of Emperor Paul I and Maria Feodorovna – Alexander (1777-1825), Konstantin (1779-1831), Alexandra (1783-1801), Elena (1784-1803), Maria (1786-1859), Ekaterina (1788-1819). The portraits are placed under glass and edged with a narrow white enamel frame with gold rims. A round carved gold rosette is placed in the center of the lid, among the portraits. The snuffbox bears a stamp of the well-known engraver Georges-François Amey. The very fact of the existence of this stamp is of interest as jewellers of that time never used to put personal stamps on their works.

The exhibition allows visitors to learn about the life of Grand Duke Paul Petrovich, and gives the opportunity to reconsider the still prevailing prejudiced attitude towards his personality.

The exhibition Grand Duke Paul Petrovich opens at the Engineer’s Castle in St. Petersburg on December 24, 2014 and runs till February 28, 2015.

Emperor Paul I of Russia and his second wife, Empress Maria Feodorovna, née Princess Sophia Dorothea of Württemberg, had six daughters: Alexandra, Elena, Maria, Catherine, Olga, and Anna. All of the grand duchesses, with the exemption of Olga who died when she was only two years old, married into the royal houses of Europe. Shy and gentle Alexandra married the Archduke Joseph of Austria and lived in Hungary; sensitive and altruistic Elena became a Princess of Mecklenburg-Schwerin when she married Friedrich-Ludwig, Hereditary Prince of Mecklenburg-Schwerin; intelligent and artistic Maria married Grand Duke Karl Friedrich of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach and presided over the cultural development of Weimar; vivacious and strong-willed Catherine was first married to Prince George of Oldenburg and after his death she married the future King William I of Württemberg; and the youngest and sombre Anna became a Dutch queen when she married King William II of the Netherlands.

Crowned in a Far Country by Gema Faye O. Nicdao, appears in the latest issue of Royal Russia Annual No. 4. Her article, which is 21-pages in length and illustrated throughout, explores the intimate lives of each grand duchess in succession of their respective births, providing the reader with many new anecdotes about the lives of these little known members of the Russian Imperial family, their marriages, their lives in their new homelands far from Russia, their deaths and the personal legacy that each left their adopted country.

A unique and rare collection of books from the library of the Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna (1786-1859), have gone on display in the Russian city of Rostov-on-Don.

The collection was given to the State Public Library in the Rostov in 1947, but it was not until many years later that the original owner of these books was found to be that of the grand duchess.

The books are bound in leather, their pages trimmed with gold leaf. It is believed that the grand duchess' library consisted of several thousand volumes, however, the library in Rostov retains only a fraction of the original collection. Many of the books are kept in special storage rooms and in need of repair. Experts estimate that the restoration would cost millions of rubles.

Born in 1786, the Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna was the third daughter of the Emperor Paul and the Empress Maria Feodorovna. In 1804, she married Charles Frederick, Hereditary Grand Duke of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach. The couple had four children together. The Grand Duchess retired from public life after the death of her husband in 1853. She died on 23 June, 1859, and was buried in a Russian style chapel at Weimar.